Insights

Competing Companies Form Partnership to Fill Home Care Gaps

Posted on Thursday, June 16, 2016 6:26 PM

Due to the gaps in care for seniors living at home, an unlikely partnership of providers with home health care and senior housing services, have teamed up to serve Michigan residents.

Tandem365 is a Michigan-based organization that offers assistance to older adults—55 and older. The partnership is described as “a handful of retirement communities and an ambulance company getting together.” The group consists of five Michigan businesses, including four senior housing providers and one wildcard—an ambulatory services company.

The following organizations have come together for this partnership:• Sunset Retirement Communities & Services• Porter Hills• Holland Home• Clark Retirement• Life EMS Ambulance

The partners had to build a network to attract support. “We were doing a good job talking with these hospitals independently, but the hospitals said the only way to meet is with everyone at once, together,” Christine Matzke, chief healthcare officer at Sunset, said Wednesday at the Post-Acute Link Care Continuum Conference in Chicago. “So, we did.”

From competition to collaboration, the groups formed a new organization that tied together all services of the parties involved. However, the ultimate goal was not to find more referral sources, but to address care gaps.

“We were competitors,” said Brian Pangle, president & CEO of Clark Retirement. “Now we sit at the table and share more than ever. It wasn’t because we wanted to come together; it was the health system that made us.”

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